Comments on: “A towel has immense psychological value” (Douglas Adams)*

By: Fool zapper

Fool zapper — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 16:42:21 +0000

Tony, I think it pisses people off that you’re not a bitter supporter.

By: walter

walter — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 13:45:33 +0000

I can give my self a second yellow card it should read: It is the towel thing I really would NOT tolerate on my playing field or should I say outside my playing field.

By: walter

walter — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 13:44:11 +0000

To put one thing clear I have nothing against a long throw itself. It is the towel thing I really would tolerate on my playing field or should I say outside my playing field.

Btw the ref is also the boss in the area outside the field (neutral zone) so he can give instructions on what is allowed in there and what not.

By: N 1

N 1 — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 13:12:57 +0000

i’ve posted this elsewhere but it is relevant to this blog:
lots seems to be have talked about Delaps ball towelling.I might be wrong but didn’t he seem to polish the ball more on the front side than back and I’m sure he was snidely unpicking the seams.

By: Diceman1984

Diceman1984 — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 13:10:33 +0000

The towel thing is just plain stupid and I hate it…the end

By: Kevin

Kevin — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 12:57:19 +0000

Legislating against the long throw seems as pointless as legislating against a long kick. As people have said, all teams need to be able to defend against the long throw just as much as against corners and free kicks. The defending team generally has more players in the area and one of them is allowed to use his hands! The time wasting over the throw is an issue though and should be dealt with.

One thing the law makers could look at though is pitch size. Stoke’s official pitch size was about the same as ours – 75 yards/68 metres width which since 2008 has been the standard requirement for international matches. When Stoke realised what Delap could do they reduced their pitch width to 70 yards/64 metres (the old international minimum), bringing the sidelines 7.5 feet/2 metres nearer the goal and this is completely legal in England. There are lots of things home sides can do that help create “home advantage” – Lord Wenger’s fondness for watering the pitch at half-time being an obvious one – so this is not a clear cut issue. Some older grounds couldn’t contain the new international standard size and would require special dispensation if used for UEFA/FIFA competitions.

What do people think? Should the proverbial level playing field mean a standard sized pitch?

By: Sir Tony

Sir Tony — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 11:30:24 +0000

Neutral fan I think we have to just agree to disagree on the issues you raise.

This site was set up because I felt there were many Arsenal sites that were totally negative, and that it was important that there should be one site that is totally pro-Wenger. I make the point clear at the top of the page – we support Wenger.

I do not seek to put forward a balanced point of view, because you can get the contrary view in hundreds of places. I might also say that the sites we tend to call “doom and gloom” don’t have a balanced point of view either.

It is in fact just like the press – you are hardly going to get a balanced view of the world reading the Daily Mail or indeed by watching Fox News.

So, I think it is fair to say, the readership here understand your point of view, but we disagree with it, and so I am not sure that we can go much further.

If I may take one point, the general view here is that the debt of Arsenal is utterly different from that of Man U and Liverpool. You say it is not (“the debt is still there”). OK, we’ve had the debate, but that’s it.

You are not going to convince us with a simple statement – and
so I think you should respect the nature of this forum. Of course you are free to make your comments, but please don’t make the same comments repeatedly when you know they are counter to the whole ethos of this site.

By: Armin

Armin — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 11:24:44 +0000

Thanks for good article Walter, and I quite sure Delap “game” will be forbidden sooner SAF start complaining about it, or once he fail to bring him in Manure.

@neutral fan
I don’t know which sport you talking about and muscles, but it has to be or a)boxing, or b)American football. As far as I know, and know little about footballing (and not American one), there were no “champions” with muscles, because that kind of game is reserved for team fighting to stay above relegation zone.
If we talking about football as world wide phenomena, and except maybe Estonian, Georgian, etc league I am watching all approachable by TV or Internet, I hardly can remember any team which boxed to title (except in boxing).
Greatest teams of world including there world champions (except England 1966)were pure technical teams.

Second thing I am wandering…how much really you know about footballing. I guess you understand that some people support Stoke, Hull, Portsmouth and believe and love their teams. I guess no one of them is idiot who cant see who is better on field, they still support their teams and you can really rare hear anyone say “ah better team beat us”.
Is it wrong? No its natural thing which come from being supporter. Becaming suporter you forever give up from being objective. And if you can be objective, than you shoudl really consider do you really suport your team. Same caunt for every segment of life, incuding my wife, who is (for me) most beautiful woman on planet. Does it mean I am blind, no it only mean I love her. Same as I love Arsenal, now you shoudl ask your self do you love Arsenal.

And at the end, litle bit about humiliation… what is humiliating in one premier league team beat other premier league team. Isnt it in nature of game. Does everyione play to win, and what gives us right to believe and want victory more than Stoke. If things are different, we would not play championship or cups at all. We would have some kind of elections, who have better players, whose players are fancier and like in figure scatting have winner by “art impression”.

By: AnonymousGun

AnonymousGun — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 10:38:42 +0000

@ neutral fan ..

You should apply for name change.. because clearly in most of yourposts, you aint neutral at all.

By: AnonymousGun

AnonymousGun — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 10:36:36 +0000

Speaking of throw ins ..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ldlAI3bUTU

sorry, but the tone of a lot of blogs since yesterday was a bit offputting.. not the writers fault altogether, but the comments are ..

Chill out, and enjoy the good football this next 4 games have in store.

By: neutral fan

neutral fan — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 10:01:46 +0000

@ alex

ur still clueless, aren’t u????this is a blog where bloggers try to distract fans from any humiliating defeat faced by arsenal(oh ya, losing to stoke 3-1 is humiliating)….they will blame injuries, financial doping,refrees and now lol lol lol , towel boy….i just can’t stop laughing…they shud be writing that it was bound to happen b’coz the team lacks enough steel and depth……let’s admit it- TO BE CHAMPIONS U GOT TO HAVE MUSCLE OF CHAMPION……

By: walter

walter — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 09:18:51 +0000

To give you an exaggerated example on something that is not forbidden but when you are a ref you should take action.
Nowhere in the rules is said that it is forbidden to hang up a mirror in the stadium. So if a team would hang up a mirror from 10 suare meters somewhere the Fa can do nothing about it.
But when you use that mirror to catch the sun and to direct the sunbeams in to the face of the keeper of the opposition to distract him than the ref should act and have the mirror covered.
One could say it is legal as it is not forbidden in the rule book but you take advantege of something outside the playing field and it is clearly against the spirit of the game.

The spirit of the game… Walter, you sound old-fashioned…

By: Sir Tony

Sir Tony — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 09:13:33 +0000

So as always the Untold crew has sorted it out. We buy a 7 feet tall player to stand in front of the thrower for each throw in, and the ref has a blue card which he shows to the captain of the team if he feels they are getting too boring.

Brilliant – I shall write to the FA at once. Watch out for further news on this campaign in the coming days, weeks, years….

By: walter

walter — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 09:11:35 +0000

Alex there is an old wisdom (?) once said to me that goes: what is not explicit forbidden is allowed. But what the towel thing does is take time away from the game and therefore it is against the spirit of the game which wants the ball to be in play as much as possible. It is a new form of time wasting.
It also is against the spirit of the game in which you can not take advantage of something from outside the playing field and in this case the towel is used to change something and therefore the ref can forbid it. If the towel had no purpose then why should they use it ? or is it just for the time wasting?
So it is not literally forbidden in the law book but it is from whatever angle you look at it against the spirit of the law.

By: Kevin

Kevin — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 09:11:21 +0000

In January 2006 we went out of the FA Cup at Bolton, having not long before gone out of the League Cup against Wigan. Four months later we were in Paris playing Barcelona in the Champions League Final.

In the next three seasons we progressed further in the domestic cups but not as far in Europe.

Just a thought.

By: walter

walter — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 08:58:33 +0000

GF60, not if you keep the 2 meter distance. There you could stand on your head if you want to the ref cand do nothing about that. Well he could if you would stand on your head…

If Stoke should stay in the PL next season I would bring on the towels from the Armoury when we play in the Emirates and when we have the lead I would use those towels every time….. But that is just my bad character showing as for AW he never would do or tell his players to do such a thing. But would be funny…. Maybe a one mans action from a player ? It would test the ref and maybe force the Fa in to action ?

By: Gf60

Gf60 — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 08:22:36 +0000

Only problem with that Walter, is that jumping in front of the thrower eventually gets you a yellow card for ungentlemanly conduct!
Obviously this form of time wasting is legal…so it’s one that we should keep in mind for times such as we’re 1-0 up and down to 10 men!
Doubt if we’ll ever see it as that’s not the Arsenal way (sometimes… such as the 4-4 with the spuds last season, we could / should definitely have used it.)

By: walter

walter — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 07:36:35 +0000

Jazbo, you have to take a distance of 2 meter from the player that does the throw-in.
What you could do is to have a player there who jumps (at the distance of 2 meter) at the moment Delap throws. If it hits his head the ball will end up somewhere but not at the goal. It will have as a result that Delap has to make a correction and has to throw with another angle and the ball would travel slower.

By: walter

walter — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 07:32:44 +0000

Steve d, good proposition. Take a throw-in within lets say 6 seconds after the ball is in their hands or the ball goes to the opposition. Nice idea, I like it.
Like Wilshere’s dad says, (how is your son btw?) a dry ball travels faster and what would a ref do if you got a penalty and the taker would take the ball out before taking it and dry the ball with a towel ? I bet that he would be booked and yet he does the same as Delap does: wasting time.

If Delap takes 10 throws in a game this means that you have lost some 6 minutes of playing time, if you take around 35 seconds average time to take his throw.

The reason Wengers doesn’t speak about it is because we have to play them in the PL, with a full squad at that time. I really hope that when we take the lead in that game and we have a throw to take the Arsenal players all will be asking for a towel to clean the ball for some 2 minutes and then throw the ball to a nearby player. Well that would be my instructions if I would be Wenger.

By: Cape Gooner

Cape Gooner — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 05:59:42 +0000

The Delap throw is akin to a corner. A delay happens as the teams completely change their formation. A further delay sometimes occurs after a corner when the attacking team passes the ball back to the goalie in order to give the team time to regain its shape.

Is the loss time for a Delap throw worse than that at a corner? Seem much the same to me.

There should be a time limit for throw ins, corners and goal kicks.